Alexander Hamilton? If you’re thinking, “Oh, no, not another founding father! Like we haven’t already studied enough about these guys,” think again. This one is really interesting, and visiting Hamilton Grange, his house, is a great way to learn about Hamilton, pre-Revolutionary America, America during the Revolution, the nation’s first years as a republic, early New York City history, and even colonial period furniture and architecture. But what should really fascinate you is Hamilton himself. If you want to write about someone who will baffle and amaze you, visit Hamilton Grange and find new appreciation for the house’s original owner.

So why is Alexander Hamilton so interesting? Here is some background to get you started. Talk about the self-made man. His father was James Hamilton, a nobleman with the title of Scottish Lord of the Grange. But Alexander Hamilton’s young life wasn’t a picnic. He was born out of wedlock in the West Indies, and his father abandoned him, his brother, and his mother when Alexander was only ten.

By the time Hamilton was twelve, his mom had died, and he’d begun supporting himself by clerking in a commercial firm in St. Croix. After putting himself through school and running the shop while its owner was away for months at a time, Hamilton earned a reputation as a standout. He was so good that his boss didn’t give him any flak for firing the firm’s lawyer during one of the boss’s long absences.

When Hamilton published an article about a 1772 hurricane, so many citizens were impressed by his talents that they funded a trip to New York to continue his education. By the age of nineteen, he had graduated from King’s College (now Columbia University) and was poised to study law. In college Hamilton had taken much interest in politics and spoke publicly for the first time in defense of the Boston Tea Party in 1773—when he was only 18! During the Revolutionary War, George Washington was impressed by Hamilton’s military and intellectual abilities and soon made him a close advisor.

Did you know that he pushed to give blacks the right to fight in the Revolution, or that after the war he founded the New York Manumission Society to encourage slaveholders to free their slaves? He himself never owned slaves; rather, he paid the few servants who worked for him. Attributing his hatred of slavery to encounters with it in his childhood, Hamilton never forgot the region where he was born. While engaged in U.S. politics, he found time to produce a practical plan for Toussaint L’Ouverture’s government in Haiti and encouraged Haiti’s successful slave revolt against the French.

Hamilton was the only New Yorker to sign the Constitution. He was also the main contributor to the Federalist Papers, which explained and championed the Constitution. As the first Secretary of the U. S. Treasury, Hamilton dealt with the national debt by insisting that government war bonds be repaid at full price. This established the government’s credibility and encouraged more citizens to buy bonds, since they were paid back with interest. The government used the money to pay back loans and invest in industries that would generate long-term wealth. Hamilton also established the Federal Bank of the United States and used his authority to encourage business and better diplomatic relations with England.

Hamilton also started the New YorkPost and ran a lucrative law practice. When he died from a gunshot incurred in a duel, he was only 49. He was a complex character study until his death: even though Hamilton helped outlaw dueling in New York, he couldn't refuse Burr’s challenge, so he and Burr went to New Jersey to duel. (Such a law-abiding citizen.) Imagine what more he might have done had he only lived, say, ten more years!

All right. So what about the house that Hamilton lived in? Well, first, he didn’t really live there. He didn’t commission the house until he had finished his political career, and it wasn’t completed until 1802. The family primarily rented apartments in downtown Manhattan so that Hamilton could be near the capitol building (Federal Hall—another National Park Service site you might want to visit) and his law practice. Once the house was built and his family moved, Hamilton was still practicing law and spent most of his time downtown.

But he did occasionally do business in the house, and the first floor is restored to show how he and his family would have used the space, including accurate reproductions of the furniture. When you walk up to the first floor, you should notice the unique symmetry of the house, including the two large octangular rooms whose walls are not all equal in size, an unusual way to proportion such a room in that period.

Aside from Hamilton, you could learn a lot here about period architecture. Unfortunately, only the first floor of the house is both restored and open to the public. However, you can see everything: grand entryway, office, dining room, sitting room, and two guest bedrooms, which hosted such visitors as Abigail Adams, Napoleon’s brother, Gouveneur Morris, and Chancellor Kent. The basement floor is also open, but not restored. Instead, it holds several text panels about the house and about Hamilton. A plus: it’s air conditioned, so if you visit the first floor in the heat you can always retreat downstairs to cool off.

After the Hamiltons left the house, it changed owners several times before being donated to St. Luke’s Episcopal Church in 1889 and being moved a few blocks to its current location. It was turned so that its original front and back are now its sides. Parts of the house were rearranged; thus, seeing its “unique symmetry” takes a little imagination. The Park Service hopes to restore all of the house and move it again to nearby St. Nicholas Park, a more rural environment, like that of its earlier days.

Although it may not seem so when you first walk into Hamilton Grange, there is a lot of useful information here for you. Start in the basement with the exhibits on the house and on Hamilton. Ask the ranger about the tours and the slide shows, which will supply you with a great deal of information you'd miss on your own. This is not a great place to try a self-guided tour, since there are no text panels at all on the first floor. Usually the tours run every hour on the hour, and the slide shows run in the middle of the day on the half hour. Just make sure that when you decide to visit, the park site is open. Currently, Hamilton Grange is only open on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays.

A small reference library includes a book of sketches of how all the rooms would have looked when the Hamiltons lived in them, including the second-floor rooms, which you can’t go up and see. You should call ahead to see if any library material would be useful for what you are studying. Your best resources are the rangers. Pick their brains. They know a lot about the house and about Alexander Hamilton and are more than happy to help you.